Your ideas are hugely valuable.

--S.B., Orinda, CA, novelist

“The endeavor of writing can be long and lonely. Mary Carroll Moore, master writing instructor, to the rescue! Moore packs How to Plan, Write, and Develop a Book with years of gritty good sense and big-picture perspective. Her techniques for drafting, organizing, and polishing a book are practical and time-tested. Here is a first-time book-writer’s best companion.”

--Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew,author of Writing the Sacred Journey: The Art and Practice of Spiritual Memoir

If I could implement all I've learned from you, I'd have a best-seller!

Pretend you’re a reporter for the New York Times. You’re going to interview your book idea.

List some questions you’d love to ask your book about its form, content, goals. You can start with something nonthreatening, as you would if you were a real reporter.

Ask your book some very good questions. Some ideas from my class are below, or you can make up your own:

What do you want to tell me about yourself?What form suits you best?Who is your readership and how will theyaccess you?What are you most eager to say?What are you most afraid to say?What genre are you?

When it runs out of things to say (or you getnervous about the answers) ask a different question.

The goal of this book-writing exercise is to surprise yourself. You’ll tap the hidden parts of yourself as a writer, the parts we often censor. You can strike gold--if you maintain the attitude of no-assumptions and anything can happen.

Books for the Blocked--These'll Get You Moving Again!

Escaping into the Open by Elizabeth Berg

Listen to Me by Lynn Lauber

Marry Your Muse by Jan Phillips

Pencil Dancing by Mari Messer

The Art of Slow Writing by Louise DeSalvo

Thinking about Memoir by Abigail Thomas

Write Your Heart Out by Rebecca McClanahan

A person’s life purpose is nothing more than to rediscover, through the detours of art, or love, or passionate work, those one or two images in the presence of which his heart first opened.Albert Camus

Friday, August 7, 2015

A
writer from New York emailed me: "I'm learning how to create from who I
am, show up and connect to readers," she said. "I get stuck because
I'm not good at the connection part. The mistake that I often make is
that people say be honest and authentic - tell me what you are thinking and feeling and I do and they don't connect with my reality. I show up and people don't understand and I get stuck."

Honesty
in writing is much-heard advice. You need to be authentic on the page,
because readers can spot a fake a mile away. But then, what's the
balance with knowing your reader, and knowing how to talk with that
reader? This writer asks a good question.

She
says more: "I've discovered that showing up in one's own authenticity
works fine as long as you fit into society. When your story is outside
of ordinary experience and/or challenges prevailing views of reality,
then one has to figure out adaptations that are consistent with
authenticity while also extending into readers' way of seeing the world
so that a connection can be found."

I
used to teach a class called "Writing through Healing." It was based
on James Pennebaker's research on how the simple act of writing can
heal. Writing that's authentic has three components:

1. It reveals the facts of the situation, using details that evoke the senses.

2. It shows how the writer felt then.

3. It shows how the writer feels now about what happened.

Each
of us can do one or more of these, but it's rare to find a writer who
does them all. But I've learned that until all three are present, the
alchemy cannot happen--either for writer or reader.

In
my classes, a writer might draft an intimate scene about something
traumatic. Anything from lying to stealing to death to abuse, and
everything in between. Each of us has suffered trauma. Our stories are
important.

At
first, most drafts include one end of the spectrum. Either the writer
enters from what I call the "inner story," and writes about the feelings
and memories in an abstract, conceptual way. Or the writer will lay
out all the details, unafraid of the facts. My job is to coach the
other aspect into being. Interestingly enough, the tears begin (in both
writer and reader) when all three elements are finally on the page.
And it truly becomes healing.

Say
you've practiced this. Your writing is beginning to include all three
elements. You've worked on bringing in the scene details (time of day
or year or season, smells and sounds) and the movements of players on
the stage (what actually happened) to satisfy point #1. You've thought
about how you felt then--terrorized, enraged, incredibly sad--and you've
begun to show this on the page, perhaps by gesture, body sensation, how
you moved or stayed very still. That satisfies point #2. You've also
allowed yourself to compare how you are now, with how you were then.
Even one line slipped in, brings that #3 point to play.

You're ready to workshop this, see how it reads to others. The litmus test.

Choose
your readers wisely. Very wisely. At this stage, you don't need
people to get hung up on what happened to you, begin to pity or avoid
you, or--worse--suggest you tone down the drama. For this first
exposure reading after you've incorporated the three points, above, you
need feedback on their ratios. How much drama is present, and is there
enough of the other two points to balance it? Have you made your own
reactions invisible, so the reader can't understand why you let yourself
go through this? (Some of us don't have a choice, granted. But on the
page, readers need to see your reasoning, your presence, not your
numbness.)

You
need someone who will (1) not make light of your trauma, (2) but not
overly react to just the trauma facts. See it as writing, not as your
life--in other words. To you, it is your life. To the reader, it has
to be a good story.

Because we are after good writing here, right? I think of some of the most admired trauma stories--All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr, about two victims of World War II; White Oleander, by Janet Fitch, about a girl whose mother murders her boyfriend; The Glass Castle, by Jeanette Walls, about a child growing up with insane parents; The Things They Carried, by Tim O'Brien, about the horrors of the Vietnam War; and so many others.

What
took these stories beyond the personal, into the universal? First, the
elegant balancing of the three points above. Good crafting with a kind
readership that could get beyond the trauma into the writing. And
finally, the release of the story to the reader when it was ready.

We write what we're given to write. It's your story. It's yours to tell.

You
may get to the place of 0ne of my students, writing about her horrific
abuse, who initially told her readers to go f*ck themselves when they
objected to her descriptions. Her fierceness has carried her through to
a final--and very strong--draft, but only when she found a group of
equally fierce readers who could handle her rage on the page. Her
advice: If you get messages to tone it down, find yourself a different
group. They are out there. Stay true to your voice, your story.

I
agree. But I'll add: Make sure you are writing through to healing,
using the technique above, improving your craft skills, and releasing
the writing itself to a larger purpose, not just your own.

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Upcoming Writing Classes with Mary

Whether you are trying to write the story of your life for publication or as a family legacy, this class by the author of two memoirs will show you how to organize your stories into readable, interesting work. You'll be introduced to a simple formula that successful authors use to find the central conflict of their story, then plan, organize, and write scenes and chapters around it. We'll explore the value of themes, how action and reflection balance one another in memoir and creative nonfiction, and authorial voice versus narrative voice. $105. Click here for details or to register.Writing RetreatsYour Book Starts Here: Week-long Writing Retreat July 30-August 3, Madeline Island School of the Arts, Lake Superior Five days of workshop, personal coaching, and plenty of time to work on your book in our great community of book writers at all stages, working in all genres, on gorgeous Madeline Island off the coast of northern Wisconsin. This retreat will become a highlight of your summer. Great meals and lodging on campus. $775. Click here for details.

Independent Study for Book Writers July 30-August 3, Madeline Island School of the Arts, Lake Superior Craving time, quiet, and a wonderful space to finally get working (or finishing) your book? But enough support each day, plus community, to do it sanely and safely? Five days of personal coaching, plenty of time to write, and optional workshops to attend make this independent study week productive, creative bliss. Great meals and lodging on campus. $775. Click here for details.

A Little about Me . . .

Mary Carroll Moore is an award-winning, internationally published author of thirteen books in three genres, writing teacher, editor and book doctor for publishing houses. For thirty years she's helped thousands of new and experienced writers plan, write, and develop--and publish!--their books. Photo by Bruce Fuller Photography.

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If you believe you have a book inside you just waiting to come out, here is a guide that will ensure your book’s arrival in the world. In clear, accessible prose, Mary Carroll Moore leads the aspiring author through every step of the challenging, rewarding process of developing and completing a full-length book.

--Rebecca McClanahan, author of Word Painting

Encouraging Words--Well-Known Writers with Large Number of Rejections--But Published!

Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo--397 rejections (and it became a movie)A Wrinkle in Timeby Madeleine L'Engle--97 rejections (and it won the Newbery Medal for best children's book of 1963; it's now in its 69th printing)Cinder Edna by Ellen Jackson--40 rejections (and it has won multiple awards and sold 150,000 hard copies). Judy Blume says she received "nothing but rejections" for 2 years.Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot--17 rejectionsHarry Potter novels by J.K. Rowling--rejected by 9 publishersThe Diary of Anne Frank--16 rejections (and now more than 30 million copies are in print)Dr. Seuss books--more than 15 rejectionsJonathan Livingston Seagullby Richard Bach--140 rejectionsGone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell--38 rejectionsWatership Down by Richard Adams--26 rejectionsDune by Frank Herbert--nearly 20 rejections

To all book writers: Believe in your story. Keep trying. The right home for your book is out there, waiting for you to discover it.

Want to get the creative brain going?

Book writers (and any writers) need to know how to engage the creative right brain that "writes" in images. Think of any wonderful book that's left you swimming in a setting or characters--the writer has successfully used the image-creating part of the brain. But our normal workaday lives short-circuit this part. Check out this cool video of Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, a brain scientist at Harvard Medical School, recounting her personal experience of a left-brain stroke and her awakening to right-brain reality. Pretty amazing fusion of brain science with what it feels like to a brain scientist having a stroke:http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/229

Flying Squirrels Bring Creative Jolt to Novelist

Flying squirrel gets into house--disrupts routine, gets novelist thinking differently. This happened to me! For two days, as I chased the squirrel (actually, it was all night since they are nocturnal), I slept very little. And got many new ideas for my novel-in-progress.Go figure!Maybe...book writers need creative jolts? Routine dulls our imaginations? How has an unexpected interruption actually been a gift for your creativity this week?

At the Loft Literary Center, I can always tell which students in my classes have taken Mary Carroll Moore’s class on book-writing. They talk about writing their book in "islands" and using storyboards to figure out how those sections relate to each other. When another student confesses to feeling overwhelmed by the material her memoir might include, they readily advise, “You should try Mary Carroll Moore’s method.” I second that.--Cheri Register, author of Packinghouse Daughter and American Book Award winner

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